What are you playing this weekend?

Still working my way through Neverwinter Nights 2 original campaign. I've come much further on this attempt than any previous... I'm into Act 3 for the first time!

Still working on the Star Coins in New Super Mario Bros. U...

Looks like it's Nier, Sleeping Dogs, aaaaaand maybe doing a quick run through of Journey. Since, you know...No one is playing it anymore

Demyx wrote:

Still working on the Star Coins in New Super Mario Bros. U...

This and maybe Netrunner?

Reached my first ending in 999 this morning, about 10-15 minutes after resuming my save. I'm going to venture a wild guess and say that that wasn't a "good" ending.

Also my first round of Company of Heroes. It didn't go so well, but I see big potential for liking the game.

I'll be making my way through Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. It started off slowly (and not in a castle) but the story has picked up and has brought me to a castle, so everything is cool. The combat has a lot of weight behind it, it's very fun.

I might start a new character in Skyrim (maybe next weekend, though; I'm enjoying Castlevania.) Skyrim dominated the Christmas season for me last year, and now that Christmas has come again I'm feeling an itch to play the game again. The snowy setting is very appropriate for this time of year.

I grabbed The Walking Dead this week. I have a feeling it would be more impactful if I wasn't playing it while living in constant fear of the baby starting to scream again.

"You think you've got problems, Lee? At least Clementine doesn't puke six times a day, constantly feeding her ear infections and waking her from a dead sleep."

I'm still enjoying it though.

Nier (gotta finish it off) and Dark Souls: Artorias of the Abyss (Manus. Will. Fall.)

Think I'm going to get in a little FTL time in. Maybe play some AC: Revelations. I gotta finish it before I go on to AC3.

Having a ton of fun co-oping in Dark Souls: Artorias of the Abyss. That's some great DLC!

AUs_TBirD wrote:

Reached my first ending in 999 this morning, about 10-15 minutes after resuming my save. I'm going to venture a wild guess and say that that wasn't a "good" ending.

It's not even possible to get a good ending the first time, so no. Worth playing through for the better endings, though.

Tons and tons of Lord of the Rings Online. I'm playing purely with the free-to-play content, and am still amazed after 70-odd hours how much there is to do, and how even familiar areas and quests are still fun and engaging.

For reasons I still cannot fathom, I bought FIFA 13 and am trying to play at least one game without feeling the sharp sting of disgrace. So far, my online opponents have shamed me by having their goalies run the length of the pitch only to have me tackle them.

Also still playing Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep. It's more my speed. I can press X a lot.

I didn't expect it to, but Don't Starve has really grabbed me. I've put in about 20 hours already, and will probably be over 30 hours before I set it aside completely.

Plus I'm still resentfully playing Far Cry 3 story missions just so I can spend these accumulating skill points that I've earned and get back to the part of the game that's actually fun - the open-world sandbox.

Skyrim. I checked out some of the new dlc house stuff, eventually adopting some orphans (aww ...) who are at Breezehome being looked after by Lydia

This is my second playthrough, started after I grabbed Dawnguard. The vampires are stirring .... Awesome game.

I got into Legend of Grimrock recently and I'm hooked. I don't know why it never really appealed to me before, but man. I just want to play that all the time now.

I'm not really certain. I'm going to be adding a few items onto my pile today, my last game purchases until February of 2013, and not sure which I'll be starting. The only one I'm certain of is Paper Mario: Sticker Star as that will be purchased today after work.

With the Steam Sale in full swing, offering great value on modern games that offer literally thousands of graphics, this is obviously the very best time to break out DosBox and go back to a 22 year old game where I drive a pixel along dead straight streets, look at plates of Alphabetti Spaghetti, referring to my knowledge of English language letter frequency and shuffle microchips in 256 glorious colours.

The game is Covert Action and its pedigree is shown by the VGA version of Sid Meier that rolls by during the opening credits. Sadly Mr Sid said that he didn't like his own game, as he felt that the mini-games in which you plant wiretaps, unravel encrypted messages and sneak about highly guarded buildings detracts from the other part of the game, where you piece together uncovered clues, shared intelligence and potentially random and unrelated satellite intercepts to reveal a grand nefarious plot. Sid said going forward he'd rather have one good game than two great ones that confused each other.

We open by choosing our sex, (Male), and our codename...

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/AxCnQ.jpg)

I have no idea why the lady's already handcuffed.

Then I'm briefly briefed by Chief Chief.

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/z0vfZ.jpg)

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/JxYVA.jpg)

Marxists? Bless. That's so adorably 1990s.

Meanwhile, early money for the terrorist leader is on the guy on the top row who is clearly Conan O'Brien with dyed hair and a fake mustache.

After this I'm given all pieces of information that the CIA headquarters in Washington deem to be potentially related to the investigation in question. Covert Action offers excellent replayability as each game picks a mastermind and a plot, then assigns sensible resources to it, in sensible geographic locations, with the potential for double agents in worldwide intelligence agencies and even, in some instances, within the CIA itself. You'll obviously see similar motifs in multiple playthroughs, but it's exceedingly unlikely you'll see the same plot twice.

In this instance, I'm given the following details :

Operational planning is taking place in Africa or the Middle East. The Marxists are involved. There are rumours of a double agent active within the CIA. CIA Athens intercepted traffic from the UK's MI6, around a $3,000 transfer of funds for unstated purpose A $3,000 money order was purchased in Amman, Jordan. $3,000 was withdrawn in one transaction from a bank in Beirut. The bank has provided a security camera picture of the man who withdrew the money. The account from which the money was withdrawn was in the name of "Fred Jones." An encrypted message "Amtel #63" was sent from Tripoli to Riyadh. $7,000 was withdrawn from the account of watchlisted German left wing operative Carl "Douglas" Baader. A Walther PPK pistol was discovered in Paris by local Police.

That may be more clues than I've ever had on a mission before. But at the same time it doesn't give me any concrete clues on where to find information. There's no one to tail outside of "Fred Jones", whose whereabouts is not known and the locations mentioned are all over the regions - Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Saudi Arabia.

Mention of MI6 is troubling, as the amount they transferred matches the amount withdrawn from the account of Fred Jones and then there's the Walther PPK found in Paris. These details could be unrelated - but it's also possible the British lost an agent in Paris and are paying money for information on his whereabouts. $3,000 wouldn't be enough to secure his freedom, so I have to presume it's for information only. The matching amounts could also just be a coincidence.

With a lot of information and no intelligence I decide to head to Jordan. If MI6 sent money to Fred Jones in Beirut and it was used to buy a money order in Amman then that'll be the place most likely to be talking about it. I don't have any leads there, but MI6 does have an office in Amman, so I'll start there.

I get to the office at 3pm on January 2nd, 1990, and with no idea of who I'm looking for, or what I'm looking for, or where to look for it, I decide I'll just tap their phones - shake the tree and see what falls out. Possibly an English guy with a Martini.

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/EwkPA.jpg)

This is what phone tapping really looks like, for reals. I get given one logic chip, (the two way arrows in the gray bar at the bottom), and can use it to switch out with (almost) any other chip. I can then use that replaced chip to replace any other, and so on. A green line means the item is not receiving electricity. A red line means it is powered. I need to switch out the chips so that the phones all go "green", without providing power to any of the alarm bells. I have an electronics skill of "Good", so I have ten minutes to do it in.

Seven minutes and thirty-six seconds later...

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/RO8i1.jpg)

Each phone successfully tapped along the way gives the potential for information, so you don't have to successfully hit all the phones to get info, but the more you get the more you get.

What I learn is :

"Agent S" has received a message from Carl Baader. "Agent S" is a member of MI6. "Agent S" is in Amman. "Agent S" is an MI6 Special Agent. "Agent S" was recruited in Damascus. "Agent S" has used the alias "Fred Jones."

I manage to pull the message "Fred" "Agent S" "Jones" received from Carl Baader and it looks like this :

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/z20Vw.jpg)

The numbers down the side are the frequency of the use of each letter in the message. The game uses a simple substitution cipher, meaning you could write a program to break it in about four minutes, but there's no penalty for screwing up here, so there's really no point. A clock counts up in the corner of the screen and you lose in game time depending on how long you take to break the code.

42 minutes and 48 seconds later, (that's not real time... honest!), we have this :

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/sWWCQ.jpg)

So clearly MI6 are involved in... something. They're providing information about a prison in Amman to Carl Baader. I'm sure if MI6 had lost an operative and knew where he was they'd do something about it themselves and the amounts of money are minuscule. I'm sure the Queen's not so short on money for Corgi food that she has to take seven grand from a German and keep four of it, before passing on the remaining three to our friend Fred. It's also not a sting, because Carl refers openly to MI6 and their help.

Then the Washington intercepts office sends me a fax...

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/gyj4o.jpg)

Thanks for that, Washington. I don't know what I'd do without you.

I hope this isn't a pointless dead end, but then waste more time as I loiter outside the MI6 office for a while, until a likely looking person comes out. I have assistance from the local CIA office and between us we use two cars to tail this lady and follow her successfully, all the way to... our own office.

Bugger.

Now what?

All Skyrim, all the time, thanks to that Gamersgate incorrectly priced Bethesda pack.

Veloxi wrote:

All Skyrim, all the time, thanks to that Gamersgate incorrectly priced Bethesda pack. ;)

Still can't believe they actually still had Skyrim keys after that, but it's fun so far.

Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Veloxi wrote:

All Skyrim, all the time, thanks to that Gamersgate incorrectly priced Bethesda pack. ;)

Still can't believe they actually still had Skyrim keys after that, but it's fun so far.

Heh, I snagged mine like 2 AM after the sale ended, once the site was working again. Only key they were out of then was Fallout 3.

Veloxi wrote:
Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Veloxi wrote:

All Skyrim, all the time, thanks to that Gamersgate incorrectly priced Bethesda pack. ;)

Still can't believe they actually still had Skyrim keys after that, but it's fun so far.

Heh, I snagged mine like 2 AM after the sale ended, once the site was working again. Only key they were out of then was Fallout 3.

Wish I'd known you had to go back to get the keys, since all I got was FO:NV Ultimate and Skyrim. I can wait for the others. My pile has broken the triple-digit mark.

Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Veloxi wrote:
Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Veloxi wrote:

All Skyrim, all the time, thanks to that Gamersgate incorrectly priced Bethesda pack. ;)

Still can't believe they actually still had Skyrim keys after that, but it's fun so far.

Heh, I snagged mine like 2 AM after the sale ended, once the site was working again. Only key they were out of then was Fallout 3.

Wish I'd known you had to go back to get the keys, since all I got was FO:NV Ultimate and Skyrim. I can wait for the others. My pile has broken the triple-digit mark.

Yeah, I think you can wait on Brink and Rogue Warrior.

Veloxi wrote:
Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Veloxi wrote:
Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Veloxi wrote:

All Skyrim, all the time, thanks to that Gamersgate incorrectly priced Bethesda pack. ;)

Still can't believe they actually still had Skyrim keys after that, but it's fun so far.

Heh, I snagged mine like 2 AM after the sale ended, once the site was working again. Only key they were out of then was Fallout 3.

Wish I'd known you had to go back to get the keys, since all I got was FO:NV Ultimate and Skyrim. I can wait for the others. My pile has broken the triple-digit mark.

Yeah, I think you can wait on Brink and Rogue Warrior. ;)

Brink looked entertaining, as did Giant Bomb's Quick Look at Rogue Warrior.

Huh, I've heard little to nothing good on them, guess I'll have to give 'em a whirl at least.

And wow Bismark, that brings back awesome memories. Looooved that game.

Trust me, Rogue Warrior is not worth your time. Except maybe for the end credits (NSFW).

ccesarano wrote:

Trust me, Rogue Warrior is not worth your time. Except maybe for the end credits (NSFW).

But it's surely got a vibrant multiplayer community.

Gonna be Dark Souls and Demon's Souls for me for the foreseeable future. And some Magic: The Gathering.

Mr Bismarck, that was an awesome AAR of Covert Action.